


Sorrow's End

by romanticalgirl



Category: Hornblower (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-08
Updated: 2013-04-08
Packaged: 2017-12-07 20:10:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/752564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/romanticalgirl/pseuds/romanticalgirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>For <span class="ljuser i-ljuser"></span><a href="http://nolivingman.livejournal.com/profile"><img class="i-ljuser-userhead"/></a><a class="i-ljuser-username" href="http://nolivingman.livejournal.com/"><b>nolivingman</b></a> who requested something based on <a href="http://www.bartleby.com/70/50030.html">Sonnet XXX</a></p><p>Originally posted 4-26-07</p>
    </blockquote>





	Sorrow's End

**Author's Note:**

> For [](http://nolivingman.livejournal.com/profile)[**nolivingman**](http://nolivingman.livejournal.com/) who requested something based on [Sonnet XXX](http://www.bartleby.com/70/50030.html)
> 
> Originally posted 4-26-07

He stares across the abandoned stage, watching as the candlelight that rims the boards goes out. He closes his eyes and inhales the familiar smells of greasepaint and powder, of sulfur and sweat. He can hear the music in the faded distance, the memory of a waltz played in counterpoint to the thunder of applause and the familiar words repeated in voices he now knows by heart.

The building fades into darkness, the workers scurrying like so many rats in the gloom, putting away the night’s work in hidden corners and cupboards, stowing away what’s left of the magic until its needed once again.

“G’night, my Lord.” One of the stagehands nods to him, tipping the brim of his cap. “Baxter’s at the door. He’ll lock up behind you.”

“Thank you, Wilson. Have a good night.”

“You too, my Lord.” He nods once more and disappears as well, swallowed up by the darkness made deeper by the heavy oak doors and the dark red seats, plush with velvet, though worn through to white in a few places, the theater slowly making its way to disrepair as the audiences fall away to fancier places, grander productions.

“Shouldn’t be here,” he reminds himself as he moves from the wings to the stage itself, treading the boards lightly. Gone is the heavy, familiar stride of the Army, lost in the fading tides of war and responsibility. He instead walks carefully, measured steps that match a different tempo; that match the steady, regal gait of the one who has walked beside him for so long. “There are ghosts.”

Still, he moves to the center of the stage and settles on the lone chair that sits there. Tonight’s production had been well done and well met by the crowd, but he’d watched with blind eyes, only seeing through memory the woman who had sat in this chair not so long ago, more full of life than he allowed, preferring to cosset her in silks and robes, bedclothes and warm brandies.

He closes his eyes and can feel her presence, as if she sits beside him, bathed in a light shown down all around her. He can hear the applause and see her bright smile, the lines around her eyes showing strongly despite her makeup, the pure joy of performance brighter than any beam they could cast on her.

It is his theater, but he will not come again. He knows that as he rises from the chair and holds out his arm, as if offering it to the lady who no longer walks beside him. He leaves the stage through the wings, threading down the hallway to the dressing room where he first made her acquaintance. It has changed as much as he has, the gowns and garments more modern than the cornflower blue dress that had brought out her eyes.

He had her buried in it, the fabric as soft as her skin, and the fabric as blue as the sky, as white as the downy fall of her hair. He had buried her in her dress but tonight, he knows as he lays a single rose across the dressing vanity, atop paints and subterfuge, disguise and illusion, he lays her to rest.


End file.
